Thornton Hough
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Thornton Hough is a quiet Victorian-era village on the Wirral in Merseyside, United Kingdom. Located near Neston, Cheshire, it is roughly five miles from Liverpool and ten miles from Chester, Cheshire.
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[edit] History
Picturesque and beautiful, the village was built in the 1880s by the third Lord Leverhulme, of the then Lever Brothers soap company, now the Unilever corporation). His aim was to create as a clean and safe environment for his workers to live in. A similar village was built in nearby Port Sunlight, next to the Lever soapworks.
[edit] Key features
The central feature of the village is the village 'green', a patch of common ground that includes a cricket green and pavilion, tennis courts, and a children's play area.
Thornton Hough also has two churches - All Saints and St George's, and a Primary School based located on St George’s way. This school building was originally built to serve as a military building, but was turned over for school usage after the Second World War. The original playground has been reduced in size due to the building extensions.
The Parish Hall is small and very Victorian-looking from the outside. The interior was recently redesigned to look more modern.
The Village Hall is a large extension to the original wooden structure hall belonging to St George’s Church and was built in the 1970’s by Collins Construction. It is also referred to as the 'New' Village Hall to set it apart from the Parish Hall. The hall has been used for all sorts of local events, and by all sorts of local groups, since it was opened - including the Cubs and Scouts, the local Badminton club, and a playschool. (The Village Hall's governing committee have recently decided to focus on profit-making rather than community-provision, as a consequence of the terms of financial aid received from the Millennium Lottery Fund. As a result many local clubs and activities will have to find an alternative venue, including the Badminton club, and the Cub and Scout groups, depriving local people of a valuable resource and a key social link. These changes in policy are proving controversial.)
[edit] Shops and pubs
For such a small village there are a good number of shops, including a small and very traditional village Post Office. The counter used to run across the length of the shop, but the interior was redesigned some years ago to maximise space and security.
Next door to the Post Office is the village's British Legion; and further up the road is the old Village Stores, which once acted as a key centre for provision for the village, but struggled to compete with the bigger and cheaper local supermarkets, and is now now renamed the Tower Tearooms.
The village also features a traditional pub called The Seven Stars, which is popular with villagers and outsiders alike. Regular pub quizzes are held here.
[edit] Other features
Just outside the village is the Westward Grange Country Club, a restaurant/club facility on the border of Thornton Hough and Neston. Also on the outskirts of the village is Thornton Hall Hotel, occasionally used by visiting football teams.
[edit] Events, clubs and festivals
Every year there is a Scarecrow Festival wherein all of the village's residents make scarecrows of varying designs and quality, to be judged at the end of a week-long open season for visitors from all over the Wirral. The festival also includes a fete on the village green. In recent years many complaints have been made by residents regarding the traffic problems caused in the small village by the influx of cars, as well as the propensity of some visitors toward vandalism and disorder, although such complaints have been disregarded by the festival committee.
There are active Cubs and Scouts groups based in the (New) Village Hall.
The village also has a very active badminton club, comprised of local people of a broad range of ages, which meets in the (New) Village Hall every Thursday. This club is to be discontinued as a result of a policy review by the Village Hall's governing committee (see below).
